versión On-line ISSN 1851-9490

Resumen

Abstract Along the centuries the modernization process of Ecuador has been under scrutiny by politicians, rulers, teachers, intellectuals, and historians. The first step of this odyssey took place about the middle of the XVIII century under the shape of rupture and confrontation with the past in several areas, and with the background of a dying colonial system and the announcement of different patterns, forces, actors, and ways of organizing reality. The liberal Revolution at the beginning of the XX century resulted in so big a change as the illustrated revolution. This project of a modern world had to deal with at least five fronts: the integration or consolidation of a national state; the creation of a secular state; the creation of a liberal state; the building of a lay society and a lay education; the strengthening of a bourgeois state. As it was then, today several areas are in crisis and in need of deep changes. It might be that this modernization is only a façade, a "traditional modernization." What problems did the modernization processes have? What factors would help overcome the usual limitations? And again, would the new process benefit a few while excluding many?